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Tuesday, July 22, 2014

PALAYANCITY, N ueva Ecija–Neophyte Mayor Adrianne Mae
Cuevas has called on the military leadership to consult the city government on
the plan to transfer the New Bilibid Prisons from MuntinlupaCity to the FortMagsaysay
Military Reservation in the province.

Cuevas
told newsmen that the Army’s 7th Infantry (Kaugnay) Division has set
for Wednesday the public hearing on the proposed transfer of the NBP but they
have not been invited to the said consultations.

“They
need to consult us Palayenos on the planned transfer. In the first place,
people from other places who will travel to the proposed NBP site in Laur will
pass our place. So our voices will have to be heard,” she said.

Earlier,
Armed Forces of the Philippines
chief of staff Ge. Gregorio Pio Catapang Jr. said President Aquino wants to
have the NBP transferred inside the FortMagsaysay Military
Reservation (FMMR) by 2014.

Catapang said the
Chief Executive wants a modern national penitentiary, reportedly worth P40
billion, to be included in his accomplishment report for 2014.

Cuevas said that
personally, she is not opposed to the project but would want that a thorough
consultation with people in the impact areas should be included in the public
hearing.

“My only concern
is the welfare of my constituents,” she stressed.

She
said that in the past months, there have been certain moves made by the 7th
ID leadership which have not been coordinated with the city government. “Sometimes, we learn of it from the
national offices instead of the 7th ID so we need to be notified
because it falls within our jurisdiction,” she said.

Cuevas
explained that consultations with local government units (LGUs) are provided
for in the Local Government Code, more specifically Sections 2 and 7.

Section
2, she said, provides that “all national agencies and offices are mandated to
conduct periodic consultations with appropriate LGUs non government
organizations and people’s organizations before any project or program is
implemented in their respective jurisdictions.”

On
the other hand, Section 7 states that “no project or program shall be
implemented by government authorities unless the consultation mentioned in
preceding sections are complied with the prior approval of concerned city
council is obtained.”

Considered
the largest military camp in the country, the 44,000-hectare reservation - named
after another democracy icon - former President Ramon Magsaysay, houses the
Army’s 7th Infantry Division (7th ID), the Scout Ranger
Regiment, the Special Forces and the Airborne Forces.

It was also in
this reservation where the elder Aquino and his fellow former senator Jose
Diokno were placed under solitary confinement for one month during the Martial
Law years.

The transfer is
now being worked out in coordination with other government offices such as the
Department of Justice and the Bureau of Corrections (BuCor) and is being eyed
as Public Private Partnership Project of the Aquino administration.

Last May, DOJ
Undersecretary Francisco Baraan, its supervising official on the BuCor and the
NBP, said the new facility being eyed is a modern one that will follow
international standards and will cost P40 billion.

Baraan
said the 551-hectare NBP in Muntinlupa , which opened in 1940, is now heavily
congested as it houses 14,500 prisoners in its maximum security detention area
alone although it was programmed to accommodate only 8,400 inmates. All in all,
the NBP houses around 20,000 inmates. – Manny Galvez